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This is my DM's perspective of my campaign. I am posting this to encourage advice to improve my game. While I have DMed for a long time, I am new to Pathfinder and am always open to suggestions. Please let me know if you read this, as I will stop posting if no one is reading.
Ok. Starting roll call
Katri - elf paladin of Torag, raised by dwarfs after family killed, from the Five Kings Mts, travelling to Magnimar to deliver important papers to an unofficial Highhelm representative there, played by someone experienced with rpgs but new to Pathfinder
Zertonis - elf ranger from the Mierani Forest, his parents were killed by a dragon, he and his sibling traveled to Kyonin after his parents death and he is now travelling to Magnimar seeking adventure, new to rpgs
Rorian - gnome cleric of Sarenrae, from Taldor, has played some D&D 3.5
Degnar - dwarf monk from Janderhoff, believer in Lissala and her seven virtues of rule, has visited Xin-Shalast after its discovery with his mentor, student of Thassilonian history, travelling to Magnimar to meet someone about a Lissalan idol, has played some D&D 3.5
Maddeva - half-elf sorcerer from Kyonin, adventuring seeking the father that raped her mother, travelling to Magnimar following rumors, new to rpgs
Tanaris - elf ranger from Kyonin, travelling to Magnimar in search of adventure, has played some Pathfinder
We are starting with the Murder’s Mark module for three reasons. First, to let the new players have an adventure that is not too combat-heavy. Second, since there are so many inexperienced players, I think they will need to be a little ahead of the curve for the campaign. Third, I feel that they need some kind of notoriety for Sheila Heidmarch to recruit them out of all the adventurers in Magnimar. Katri and Zertonis are travelling with the same caravan so they already know each other.
They arrive in Ilsurian and stay the night. I have a group of young players here and it shows sometimes, like now when most of them want to “go drinking”. There is nothing wrong with that, but experienced players tend to have gotten beyond that. I suspect I am going to have to stat up a few bar patrons for the inevitable bar fights.
The next day they head out to the carnival that is on the edge of town, for their own reasons. I tried to give them plenty of opportunities to play carnival games but they mostly did not want any of it. They did go to the zoo and, even though they were pretty sure that the “baby dragon” was not really a dragon, none of them have ever seen a dragon to be sure. After that they played a few carnival games, with Katri winning the “Queen of the Carnival” crown, then just waited by the sphinx tent until the sphinx appeared. Katri did detect evil on just about everyone was not really surprised by any evil she found. Later, she also did that with the sphinx with, understandably, no result. They all did take this time to introduce themselves to each other.
While waiting, the “baby dragon” breaks free. Due to some PCs deciding to do nonlethal damage, the lizard is knocked unconscious but not dead. It was very fast too, all finished in one round. The zoo-keeper shows up, his helpers haul the lizard away, and he rewards the PCs. The rest of the day is uneventful except for Degnar visiting the sphinx and asking questions every time she makes an appearance, and Maddeva trying to poke the sphinx and getting thrown out.
Next day, they are summoned to the carnival where Almara asks them to investigate the murder of a local pawnbroker to clear the good name of the carnival. Of course they accept. The module includes a few questions that a party might ask and how Almara would answer but this party doesn't ask anything. They go to talk to the sheriff. She tells them what happened and has a constable lead them to the spot where the body was found. Some good rolls and the party is able to determine that the “sphinx” tracks at the murder scene are fake. They then go to the dead man’s place of business and meet his widow.
The widow tells them that the body has been taken to the church to prepare it for burial. Some players want to check the body but they decide to investigate the shop, which was robbed and a guard killed after the murder of the pawnbroker. After a cursory examination of the main area, noting that some gems and jewelry were stolen, they head down to the vault. Katri is using detect evil on everything in sight and sees a skulk trying to sneak out. Everyone tries to deal nonlethal damage to the creature until Zertonis realizes that, in order to use his bow, he has to deal lethal damage. Unfortunately, he scores a critical hit. Fortunately, he does not kill her, although he comes close and would have done so under D&D 3.5 rules.
Taking the unconscious skulk, the party leaves. While leaing the vault, Degnar spots a trap door in the hall outside the vault, and they ask the widow to disarm it. She does so, and the party starts to proceed out. Degnar rolled a Perception check and heard someone crying. They determine its in the trap and they open it to find another skulk. I could have let them walk by without finding him, but I kinda wanted them to find him so I let them have a Perception check. They rescue him from his prison in the trap, and take both skulks to the sheriff. During the interrogation, they show how new they are to this, and miss asking a lot of questions that might have got them more information. The sheriff had to do some asking for them, just to reveal some important information. Noticing that the creatures are showing signs of addiction, Katri wishes she had the ability to remove disease.
The party returns to the carnival to inform Almara of what they found. Degnar realizes that they did not tell the sheriff about the false tracks. They return and inform the sheriff and she advises that, while this looks good for the carnival, it is not definite proof.
The rest of the day is uneventful, with Degnar visiting the sphinx during her every appearance and asking her questions, seemingly wanting to free her. Maddeva tries to sneak into the sphinx’s tent at one point, but she’s seen and barred from entering. They spend another night in Ilsurian, again “going drinking.”
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Tanaris' player was able to join us tonight. He was attending a company Christmas party during the first game session. I had a long discussion with the player about introducing him. My plan was to have him be present during the next confrontation, or be the person who finds the body. He didn't like that idea. Since the party wants to find the tribe of skulks, he suggested that he be in jail after being arrested for a bar fight and be allowed to go free in return for information about where the skulk tribe is. I was okay with that, even though I don't like players dictating the circumstances of their entry into the game. I have had too many characters give me some idea of how they would like to be introduced to the campaign and then turn to me and say "My character wouldn't be interested in that." In this case, things did not turn out exactly as either I or the player planned.
I know that two of the other players, the new ones, like the idea of going to the bar/tavern at night to go drinking. I have not played that out, since I feel that it is unimportant to the overall story. However, since Tanaris wanted to be introduced after a bar fight, I planned on playing out the bar fight. We had ended with the night over, but I backtracked a bit and let them play out "going drinking." Maddeva, Zertonis and, surprisingly, Rorian, wanted to go. Tanaris indicated he would be at the "sailors" bar, as it had more bar fights. I gave the other players the option of going there or to the more "polite" bar that doesn't really allow bar fights (two big high-level friends of the bartender keep the place respectable). They, of course, picked the nice bar. So, no bar fight to play out.
The next morning, the sheriff summons the party to the jail. She explains the situation (Tanaris is jailed beside the skulk so the conversation was easy to explain) and the party agreed to follow Tanaris to the skulk tribe. The sheriff explained they would be going alone as her constables were all busy trying to keep things peaceful between the villagers and the circus. Tanris, however, asks how much they will pay him. (surprised face) Katri tells him that it depends on how things play out. Tanaris, appearing not to understand, asks what that means. Katri explains that it depends on how much treasure they can find and everyone at the table laughed, since they had understood her meaning from the beginning.
They travel to the skulk tribe. None of this is detailed in the Murder's Mark module, so I was kind of making it up as we went along. I played the skulks as kind of homeless, listless addicts living in makeshift lean-tos and eating roots and berries. Some of them were still sleeping off a dose of shiver but a couple were awake. Again, it was explained that two skulks had joined the human drug dealers and they were the only contact that the tribe had with the drug dealers. The humans never came to the tribe so could not be described. The party heads back to town, but Tanaris says he did his part so he's just going to hang out here. Katri catches on (he's waiting for someone to show up) and waits with him.
The four remaining party members are summoned to the circus by Almara. She wants to know if they have discovered anything since yesterday. During this conversation, really an excuse to get them to the circus for the next two events, there is a commotion on the parade ground. There is a confrontation between four villagers and two circus people ("enforcers") as a LOT of villagers are having their purses cut. As explained in the module, the cut purses are really the result of the same people who framed the sphinx for the first murder. Now, the two new players stepped up. Maddeva tried to use Diplomacy to calm things down but she wasn't very skilled at that. Zertonis got on the other side of the group and also tried with no effect. I reminded Maddeva that she took ranks in Intimidate for this very reason. However, I explained that I needed a general idea what she was doing to intimidate them. With a suggestion from my wife, who watches but does not play, she had her hawk familiar swoop down on the confrontation. She rolled great and it worked! It pushed the two groups apart and the confrontation broke up. Just to note, with experienced players I don't generally like outside suggestions or meta-gaming but with new players I'm more lenient.
So, things suddenly changed as someone found the body of the local cleric in front of the sphinxes tent. Another murder committed by our villains but trying to frame the sphinx. This was probably the most frustrating part of the game session. There were lots of clues to find, but everyone kept rolling low on their skill checks to find them. It took a gentle reminder from the DM that they could take 20 on these checks if they wanted. Even then, they only did that once and promptly forgot again. (smacks forehead) After finding three vials of alchemical solution in the tent, Zertonis decides to head into town to talk to the alchemist. Rorian goes with him as she decides, wisely, that he shouldn't go alone. So, now the the party is split into three!
After they leave, Degnar finds the back of the tent has been unstaked and humanoid tracks lead outside. He finds two clown outfits stashed somewhere before the tracks blend in with other tracks too much to follow. Almara, the circus owner, shows up and Degnar explains what has happened and what he found. Then the sheriff shows up. She demands to see the sphinx and Almara explains that the sphinx is not present and that, in reality, she is not a prisoner but a traveller with the circus exploring this part of the world. The sheriff basically tells her to pack up and leave town asap!
Meanwhile, Zertonis is visiting the alchemist. This was quite amusing, especially to me, as she is actually one of the villains of the module. I played her as kind of cranky but not old. Rorian's player was able to describe some items she would have due to having watched the show "Oddities" on television, which was helpful. However, she was not much help to Zertonis, naturally, and they left without suspecting anything.
Zertonis went to join Katri and Tanaris in the forest, while Rorian joined Degnar and Maddeva at the circus. Degnar explained what had happened and they headed back to the village, since there was little more they could do. On the way back, they found some villagers beating a boy. This time it was Rorian and Degnar's turn to shine. They basically got the villagers to let the boy go, and were very admonishing to the villagers. Two of the villagers even helped carry the boy back to his family at the circus. They played this out very well, not even thinking about attacking the villagers or anything. The boy's family gave them a scarf, which they may find out eventually is magical, and they decided to pack it away, which proved to be a wise decision later.
Katri, Tanaris and Zertonis decide to check out the place where the local shiver addicts stay (the "shiver den"). They question a fellow that's there and he tells them that he gets his shiver from a guy named Gareth at one of the taverns. Again, this was me just making it up as I went. Talking to the bartender revealed very little except that Gareth didn't come in until late but the bartender wasn't sure what he did for work. While they are at the bar, one of the constables finds them and tells them to come with him to see the sheriff. The same thing happens to the group who are just leaving the circus.
The sheriff is with a body hanging on a tree. Katri is ready to believe its the "Gareth" they were trying to find. I almost wish it was! The sheriff explains it is Filton Legg, a local shiver addict and well-known figure in the village. Degnar checks the body, finding a note explaining that Legg had recently been employed by a local wealthy businessman, Arnahem Braeton, and a harrow card with a picture of a sphinx. The sheriff decides to arrest the circus owner, as the sphinx will not be present to arrest.
Now, the way this is explained in the module is that the party will think the seemingly unimportant clue about the job is, in reality, important and go to Braeton's manor with this in mind. This party, however, just thought they had no other leads so they would just talk to the employer. Instead of scouting the place out, as the module is prepared for them to do, they just walk right up to the door. At least the door being ajar makes them cautious. They don't see anyone in the grand entry hall so they walk in. Now, there are two thugs behind one door, another thug behind another door, and a fourth thug hiding outside waiting to come in behind them. Katri walks up to one of the doors and opens it, prompting the thug behind it to fire an arrow at him.
I'm not going into fight details. Most of it doesn't need description, for example typically misses and hits. The best parts, however, are Tanaris the ranger trading bow shots with a thug, with neither of them hitting the other for 4 or 5 rounds, Zertonis being annoyed when a thug hits him with a shortsword, and Rorian going near every thug that falls and casting stabilize so they can be questioned later, an idea suggested by Degnar. During the fight in the grand entry hall, one of the main villains comes out of a second story room and on to the landing of the grand staircase. he appears to look just like Katri, due to an alchemical solution, and saying "Slaughter these idiots and get to secure locations afterward. I've spared the children." He then lets the illusion fall, showing the party that he is framing them somehow and says "After all, there's nothing more compelling than a living witness." He then heads back into the room he came from, saying something in his own voice about helping.
The night ended with the end of the fight, although one thug ran away during the fight. I did explain that the main villain was also gone but will play that out next game session. According to the module, both of them will go to the sheriff and accuse the party of being the killers, so next game session the party will be confronting their accusers. Of course, they have some unconscious thugs who might tell a different story.